I visited a local library that I haven’t been to in a few years, one night after work this week. The library has one service desk in their adult area. I approached the person working at the desk and said that I was looking for a good book and wondered if they had any recommendations. The person starts off by asking what I’d read recently that I enjoyed. I mentioned that I’d really been getting into thrillers and had read a book by Ruth Ware and the librarian said they had some suggestions. Then another librarian pops out from the back work area and says they also had some recommendations. The librarians ended up tag teaming the question. They walked with me to the stacks and asked questions like:
• What authors have you read that you really liked?
• What about thrillers did I enjoy, the mystery part, the pacing, detailed plots etc…
• Did I like books set in small towns or other locations?
I walked away with three books that I ended up checking out. Plus, a nice list of future book ideas and authors, as well as an invite to a bookclub one of the librarians hosts each month.
The librarians did not use any special tools to suggest books. Both librarians were readers of the thriller genre, so that definitely helped. It did make me wonder if it had been a different genre if it would have been as successful. But overall, it was a great experience, and I would go back for more recommendations.
Hi! I've never asked, nor had asked this question: "Did I like books set in small towns or other locations?" I think that is a brilliant RA question! Setting is important for RA, and we can filter so many stories with specific types of settings based on the answer we get from our patrons to this question. Another question could be do you like books set in cities/fast-paced environments or small town/rural lifestyle vibes?
ReplyDeleteHi Mary,
ReplyDeleteThat's so awesome that you had not one, but TWO people excited about giving you books recommendations. They must be really knowledgable about the thriller genre to be able to ask those specific questions.
This is like, the dream RA interaction. It sort of confirms that book recommendations work best as a conversation - adding an additional (and enthusiastic) person to the mix probably helped a lot. I hope we get to read about that book club when we get to the book club assignment! How fun. :)
ReplyDeleteHi Mary! It sounds like you had a great experience with this assignment! Having two people adding to the conversation and recommendations probably helped make sure that nothing was missed in the interview. Was it at all overwhelming to have two people helping you at once? In previous customer service jobs, I've found that two people helping can sometimes lead to speaking over each other, or information overload. Obviously though, that isn't always the case!
ReplyDeleteIt's great that you left with so many suggestions! If you don't mind sharing, what books did you end up leaving with?
It wasn't very busy when I visited this library. So, I think that definitely helped. You could tell that these librarians worked well together. I ended up checking out:
DeleteThe Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware
Sworn to Silence by Linda Castillo
Left to Die by Lisa Jackson
It's always fun to have a chance to talk about books with other people.
Mary,
ReplyDeleteThe scenario you're talking about happens every time someone walks to the reference section at my library and there is more than one person working. All of my coworkers like the fantasy genre, so people asking for those kinds of books usually have good luck finding things.
In response to your question about whether the experience would have been the same if the librarians' hadn't preferred your genre, I wonder the same thing. I guess that's why we do these classes to learn how to ask questions about books that we aren't as inherently interested in. We can't (and I also don't want) to read everything, so learning how to ask questions, how to learn from our coworkers, and how to use reference aids like Novelist can make it simpler for us to recommend things we may not even like.
Great write up and conversation!
ReplyDelete